Security watchers Marshal claim the infamous Storm botnet is no more, after waning spam emails finally dried up altogether last month.
Other security researchers have noted a similar decline, but warn that while the botnet is currently inactive it may yet return, possibly in a more potent form.
Storm front
The malware used to …

May be dead, but

The open question

""I think the question isn't 'is Storm dead', but more like when will we see it return and what new features or tactics will it have in store for us."

Yeah for me this is the open question as well. Even if the original users of the Storm worm don't intend to use it any more, I wonder if someone won't crack the command and control and use it themselves... I assume it's still a fairly large botnet after all.

Shoulder pork and ham

Go Microsoft

Nice work on cleaning it up. I guess the lesson learned here for the criminals in question is to target Apple next time around. Plenty of users there and Apple has shown a disdain for updating against known security threats.

Closed for upgrade

So long, Storm...

I'd worry that they've simply cloaked it

If something seems too good to be true, it probably is too good to be true. The people behind Storm showed a huge leap in innovation. I'd be worried they made another such leap, and have figured out how to fly below all the Security Researcher's radars.

Re:flying below the radar

I've noticed a marked drop in spam mail across all of my accounts as well. If you call that flying below the radar, well then they can fly all they want, I don't mind.

What you might mean to say is that a new Storm II is quietly replicating itself without activating, extending its footprint and keeping mum until the day it unleashes a hurricane of spam and all security centers are drowned in data.

Now that would worry me if only for the ungodly amount of spam I'd be getting across 7 accounts.

Typical MS.

".....274,372 Windows PCs were cleaned up using its tool during the first month alone."

And how do they know? Just once could MS do the decent thing and provide their bloody utilities without succumbing to the temptation to build in a "phone home" feature?

I'd always thought of the Malicious Software Removal Tool as evidence that at least some bits of MS were trying to do the right thing. Lesson learned here is that if it looks too good to be true, it probably is.

Bought out by MS?

Pure speculation, of course. Perhaps Microsoft bought the Storm bots to bolster their tragic security reputation? They surely have deeper pockets than random V14gr@ pushers, and they can't have spent $300 million on those damned silly commercials with BillG and Jerry.

I also have a really hard time believing that their "Last Century Tech (TM)" signature-based AV brought down a state of the art botnet.

Meaningless

Wish_for_more

storm spam is over but not the badness behind it...they will come back or get converted into some other botnets..

http://blog.fireeye.com/research/2008/10/storm-just-befo.html

With the fact that Srizbi, Rustock , Pushdo and Storm might be running by the same group of bad guys we might see it coming in other botnet form. Btw, 150, 000 zombies as the initial start is not bad for a new botnet ;).